From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia

Scarifying (also scarification modification) involves scratching, etching, burning / branding, or superficially cutting designs, pictures, or words into the skin as a permanent body modification. In the process of body scarification, scars are formed by cutting or branding the skin by varying methods (sometimes using further sequential aggravating wound healing methods at timed intervals, like irritation.), to purposely influence wound healing to scar more and not scar less. Scarification is sometimes called cicatrization (from the French equivalent).